296 THE WASPS. 



made them fancy that they had discovered a valuable 

 prize ! 



The nests of the common wasps (Vespa vulgaris) are 

 smaller, and are sometimes found above as well as under- 

 ground, and from outside with their paper-like coverings 

 look very much like a lump of coal. None the less they 

 often contain the enormous number of ten thousand cells, 

 after they have originally consisted of only from eight to 

 ten, and have been constantly enlarged according to the 

 needs of the increasing population. The entrance is found, 

 as a rule, at the lower end of the pear-shaped hanging nest, 

 and is watched day and night by the wasps, as among bees 

 and ants, by a guard or sentinel, which warns the population 

 within of any approaching danger. The males work in the 

 interior of the nest just like the ordinary workers, but they 

 seem to confine their labor chiefly to the cleansing of the 

 nest, the carrying out of dead bodies, etc. They are fed, 

 like the real females and the workers busied in the nest, by 

 the out-flying wasps, which bring home animal food and 

 fruits, and are robbers and murderers as bold as they are 

 crafty. Like falcons, they pounce upon other insects, tear 

 or bite off head, wings or legs, and carry home the quiver- 

 ing stump. Flies and bees suffer specially from them. In 

 butchers' shops, after they have satisfied themselves, they 

 will tear and carry off pieces of meat half as large as them- 

 selves. With soft fruits they suck themselves as full as 

 possible, and divide the superfluity at home from mouth to 

 mouth among comrades and larvae. As soon as a worker 

 laden in this way reaches the nest, it is at once surrounded 

 on all sides and relieved of its booty. The larvaa are fed, 

 like young birds, from mouth to mouth, and it is curious to 

 see with what eagerness and speed the female hurries from 

 cell to cell and gives each larva its share. As soon as a 

 larva changes and leaves the cell as an imago, the cell is, 

 as with the bees, most carefully cleaned and prepared for 

 the reception of another egg. 



Dr. Darwin (" Zoonomia," sec. xvi.) tells of a wasp which 

 he observed trying to fly through the air with a large fly it 

 had caught, after it had torn off its head and abdomen. 

 The wind was against it, and the wings remaining on the 

 stump formed so great an hindrance that the wasp, in order 

 to avoid it, flew down to the ground, tore them off, and then 



